Allen Carr's Easyway to Stop Smoking - Allen Carr [4]
Of course not. Like every other smoker, we fell into a trap. The nicotine trap is the most subtle, sinister trap that man and nature have combined to devise. There is not a sane parent on this planet—smoker or non-smoker—that likes the thought of their children smoking. Surely this is because deep down, all smokers wish they had never started. Not surprising really, no one needed cigarettes to enjoy meals or cope with stress before they got hooked.
At the same time all smokers want to quit, all smokers also want to keep smoking. After all, no one forces us to smoke—it is only smokers themselves who decide to light up.
If there were a magic button that smokers could press to wake up the following morning as if they had never lit that first cigarette, the only smokers left would be the youngsters who are still at the experimental stage, playing with fire, convinced they could never get hooked. Didn’t we all start that way?
The truth is that the only thing that keeps us smoking, the only thing that prevents us from breaking free is: FEAR!
Fear that as non-smokers, we will have to struggle through the rest of our lives feeling deprived and miserable; fear that we will need endless supplies of willpower to conquer the terrible cravings; fear that a meal or a social occasion will never be quite as enjoyable without a cigarette; fear that we’ll never be able to concentrate, handle stress or be as confident without our little crutch; fear that our personality and character will change; but most of all, the fear that we will never be completely free, and that we will spend the rest of our lives wanting to smoke but not being allowed to.
If, as I did, you have already tried all the ‘conventional’ ways to quit you will not only be dominated by those fears I describe, but also convinced you can never get free.
If you are apprehensive, panic-stricken or feel that the time is not right for you to stop, then you are being affected by the fear. As I will show throughout this book, that fear is not relieved by cigarettes but created by them. Non-smokers don’t have any of these fears.
You didn’t decide to fall into the nicotine trap. Like all traps, it is designed to ensure that you remain in it. Ask yourself, when you lit those first experimental cigarettes, did you think you would remain a smoker as long as you have? So when are you going to quit? Tomorrow? The next Great American Smokeout? New Year’s Eve? Next year? Stop kidding yourself! The trap is designed to hold you for life. Why else do you think all those other smokers didn’t quit before it killed them?
This book was first published in 1985. It has sold over 11,000,000 copies and been a bestseller every year since then. In putting together this brand new US edition, we are using over twenty-five years of feedback from both our seminars and previous editions. As you will soon be reading, that feedback has revealed information that has exceeded my wildest dreams regarding the effectiveness of EASYWAY. It has also revealed two aspects of the method that have caused me concern. The second I will cover in just a moment. The first arose out of the many letters I have received from readers. I give three typical examples:
‘I didn’t believe the claims you made and I apologize for doubting you. It was just as easy and enjoyable as you said it would be. I’ve given copies of your book to all my smoking friends and relatives, but I can’t understand why they don’t read it.’
‘I was given